Gummo

Rating:
Summary: A DEFINITE MUST SEE
Review: IF YOU WANT TO SEE A BLACK DWARF ARM WRESTLING AND A GROWN MAN BEAT A CHAIR UP THEN WATCH THIS, MOST PROBALY THE STRANGEST MOVIE EVER MADE

Rating:
Summary: We need more Gummos
Review: I bet if most of the people who found Gummo disgusting watched it a few more times they'd change their minds about it. It's really not that bad: certainly not the Faces of Death meets Pink Flamingos that some people make it out to be. In fact, much of it is downright sweet! I challenge anyone to hold up those scenes in Gummo they consider disturbing alongside any handful from, oh, Raging Bull (to pick one of any hundred "acclaimed" films). If anyone really thinks a few fake dead cats are harder to stomach than the deluge of violence in that film, something's very wrong. Maybe we've gotten too used to seeing horrifically ugly images rendered innocuous by style.

I wasn't familiar with all the brouhaha surrounding Gummo when I caught it late one night on IFC. I had no idea that people like Werner Herzog and Gus Van Zant were calling it the harbinger of a cinematic revolution or that most critics thought it was the movie equivalent of anthrax. I was able to be completely objective and, in all honesty, I was deeply moved.

Here's how I see it. Gummo is about a segment of the population that (I would imagine) most film critics haven't (unlike Korine) spent much time around, and he never throws those folks an ironic, self-referential bone. You think any minute the film will drop the sincerity and settle into John Waters territory but it doesn't. Instead it grabs you by the scruff of the neck and says, "Watch this mentally retarded girl run back and forth, back and forth. Watch her gleefully shave off her eyebrows. You expect her to be wrenchingly pathetic or sublimely noble, right? Well she's neither. She's a human being, and she's having fun." Those are just two beautiful, tender moments out of many.

Is it high art? No. But what movie is? Maybe The Battleship Potemkin and a handful of others approach high art but let's face it: most movies, from The Godfather to Tommy Boy, are really just entertainment. Gummo might provide a few more jolts than your average entertainment does, and, yes, it's probably a little indulgent at times, but overall it's just a sincere, brave little movie.

Rating:
Summary: True Poetry
Review: "Only powerful theologians could put this piece in disfavor-because of its controversial statments on the nature of deeds of the fallen angels."

Rating:
Summary: This Way to the Egress
Review: All of you who think this movie is Great Art have been bamboozled. This is just pretentious swill. There are those who insist upon catagorizing anyone who dares to criticize this movie as conformists and idiots. To them I say, pretentious swill like Gummo can be just as obnoxious as mindless swill like Armageddon. In fact, the two movies are similar. One uses exploding rocks and loud noises to pummel you into submission, and the other uses freakish and garish imagery to pummel you into submission.

Rating:
Summary: inspiring...the punk rock of movies
Review: If you're adventurous in your movie watching you'll at least respect Gummo and you might even come out truly inspired. I've never seen a more original film. Godard, Bunuel, Peter Greenaway and a few others have probably done some things that were just as original but not more so. But that's not to say it's some dull art film that you have to research to understand. Far from it. Gummo is a punch in the face. It's about real people and real life. Kids do sniff glue and kill cats and rednecks do tear stuff up when they get wasted. They always have. I'm almost 30 and they certainly did in the 70s when I was a kid.

Gummo takes realism to whole new level but it's not just a nihilistic rant. It's a sort of collage of rural, white lower-class survival. Of course it's not all pretty, and a lot of it maybe just a little too ugly for some, but there is beauty too. And I think the real beauty is that nobody's dreaming of a better life. People go around dreaming of a better life all day in Hollywood movies. In real life, most people try to make money so they can eat and have a little fun. They dream on the side.

Gummo is the film American Beauty wished it could have been.

Rating:
Summary: love
Review: I had never fallen in love with a film until I saw Gummo. The crazy and pointless scenes will disturb you and make you feel every emotion on the spectrum. There is no sap in this movie. The characters are twisted and you neither hate them nor love them. It is an amazing viewing experience... like a vivid vivid nightmare about the craziest white trash you can imagine.

Rating:
Summary: Gummo - How twisted can you get?
Review: On first seeing this fim in the video store, I was taken by the weird cover. I thought, "it looks weird, I must watch it!" Seems as though you can judge a book by it cover. This was the most weird and hilarious movie I have ever seen.

I would totally recommend it to those strange people out there like myself who get a laugh out of the weird, obscure and down right sick.

The most fascinating part about this movie is that this sort of thing actually goes on in the world today. Consider this when you are watching it and , no matter what you do, DON'T PASS THIS MOVIE.

Rating:
Summary: Don't subject yourself to this junk
Review: Trashy, exploitative, and pointless film which goes for shock value with no substance. A horrifyingly bad movie unless you like watching degenerate behavior. I am no prude, but this film stinks badly. I'm so glad it bombed at the box office. It deserved to!

Rating:
Summary: A unique and moving film
Review: I saw Gummo last year (1999) and still think about it. It is one of the best films I've seen, and a film that stays with you. A documentary like film about young people in a small American town. Although the lives shown are squalid and trite, there is an underlying humour, and a "What the heck it's Friday night, I'll pick a fight with a chair, if nothing else is happening" attitude. A brilliant film. Just go see it. A lot has been said about the Danish "Dogma" films and the hand-held camera technique of the "Blair witch project". Gummo fits into this genre too. Again, see this fascinating film, it'll make you think.

Rating:
Summary: FAVORITE
Review: Gummo is a wonderful film. I love the music especially. I don't think everyone will love the film, but I do think everyone should see it. It's like therapy. The film is like a bad dream that you had and don't want to remember, but then when you do remember, you realize that it was really funny. I could watch Gummo a million times, and still want to see it again.